This story additionally ran on Mic. This story will be republished at no cost (details).
EDGEWATER PARK, N.J. — Not way back many citizens knew little about Tom MacArthur. A low-key reasonable Republican congressman in a district that twice went for Barack Obama, he burnished his status because the man who labored with Democrats to assist rebuild within the years after Hurricane Sandy.
Now, as he wages a bitter combat for re-election to a seat he received by 20 proportion factors simply two years in the past, even a few of his supporters have turned virulently towards him. The purpose? His new status because the turncoat whose laws nearly repealed the Affordable Care Act.
Like many Republican candidates struggling to clarify how they may help protections for preexisting situations whereas additionally supporting adjustments that will intestine them, MacArthur has supplied obscure however persistent guarantees to defend Americans with medical situations.
But he additionally wrote the Republican laws that will have allowed states to cost these Americans increased premiums or restrict what companies are lined, gaining sufficient help for the repeal invoice to clear the House final 12 months.
As such, MacArthur’s candidacy has develop into a sort of Rorschach take a look at for Republicans’ repeated makes an attempt to repeal and in any other case undermine the Affordable Care Act — and the way a lot candidates in swing districts pays for these efforts.
If this New Jersey district is any indication, it may very well be rather a lot.
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Sue Coleman, 64, cut up her poll in 2016, voting for MacArthur and Hillary Clinton. “I thought he was a moderate, so I voted for him,” she mentioned. Today, she feels so indignant that she arrived at a latest political occasion on the 45th Street Pub right here carrying an unruly wig, a full beard and mustache paired with a darkish swimsuit and blood-red tie — imitating one of many congressman’s prime aides who has develop into a well-recognized gatekeeper as she and others have personally lobbied MacArthur. The crowd laughed and cheered.
Earlier that day, dozens of individuals, most of them girls, gathered in a strip mall car parking zone earlier than scattering to knock on doorways on behalf of MacArthur’s Democratic challenger, Andy Kim. MacArthur “didn’t listen to the people,” mentioned Nancy Keegan, 57, of Delran Township, N.J., as she stood together with her sisters.
Some of the volunteers couldn’t assist however level out that the highschool throughout the road was the place MacArthur held an almost five-hour city corridor final 12 months that made national headlines for the irate crowd of constituents and protesters who shouted down explanations of his makes an attempt to resuscitate the repeal effort. MacArthur has made fewer, and extra restricted, public appearances since then.
In an indication of the race’s energy to assist Democrats reclaim the House, members of Planned Parenthood, NARAL and Rep. Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) have been readily available to energise the sweatshirt- and sneaker-clad crowd. While it has been a few 12 months and a half since MacArthur bolstered the Republican repeal effort, the anger hasn’t light. Said Susan Harper, 64, additionally of Delran Township and Keegan’s sister: “I don’t think that’s going away.”
Dozens of supporters, most of them girls, gathered in a strip mall car parking zone in Willingboro Township, N.J., in October to help Democrat Andy Kim (proper) in his bid to unseat Republican congressman Tom MacArthur. (Emmarie Huetteman/KHN) Dozens of supporters, most of them girls, gathered in a strip mall car parking zone in Willingboro Township, N.J., in October to help Democrat Andy Kim in his bid to unseat Republican congressman Tom MacArthur. (Emmarie Huetteman/KHN)
MacArthur, 58, a rich insurance coverage government who has acquired tons of of 1000’s of dollars in company contributions and invested millions of his own in his campaigns, is locked in “a true toss-up” this 12 months, mentioned David Wasserman, an editor on the Cook Political Report. Kim, 36, — a former Obama administration nationwide safety official — had raised $750,000 more than MacArthur had by the top of September.
Trump received MacArthur’s third Congressional District — which spans the state from the suburbs outdoors Philadelphia to the vacationer locations and retirement communities of the Jersey Shore — by about 6 factors. In spring 2017, as House Republicans bickered over how one can repeal the well being care reform regulation, MacArthur — then a pacesetter of the chamber’s reasonable Republican caucus — brokered a deal with far-right members. It would have allowed states to avoid among the regulation’s protections for individuals with medical situations, in the event that they arrange high-risk insurance coverage swimming pools to assist cowl these sufferers.
Through that compromise, generally known as the MacArthur Amendment, the invoice handed the House with none Democratic help. It later stalled within the Senate.
Less than every week later, showing at that city corridor in his district’s Democratic stronghold, MacArthur spoke of dropping his 11-year-old daughter, Grace, to a uncommon neurological situation, a painful story he had not often mentioned in public.
The demise of MacArthur’s daughter “is the very reason his constituents do not understand his actions,” mentioned Maura Collinsgru, the well being care program director at New Jersey Citizen Action, a liberal watchdog group. “How could you, having had that experience, justify your votes?”
Democrats throughout the nation have been hitting their Republican opponents arduous on the difficulty in gentle of the repeal effort and a authorized effort by many Republican state attorneys basic to finish protections for preexisting situations. Republicans are preventing again with guarantees however few plans to match. During a latest discussion board on an area TV station, MacArthur mentioned: “I fought to protect preexisting conditions, and I’ve always supported that.”
The MacArthur marketing campaign didn’t reply to a number of requests for an interview.
Kim, who has by no means held elected workplace, began contemplating whether or not to run when MacArthur’s compromise was launched, he mentioned. But he was satisfied after docs warned him and his spouse that their unborn son was dangerously underweight.
“I told my wife that if we could get through this, and if our baby is born and he is stable, I want to do what I can to hold my representative accountable for what he did,” he mentioned. Today, Kim mentioned, his son is doing high quality.
Kim has framed himself because the anti-MacArthur, vowing to carry in-person city halls as soon as a month and reject company contributions.
Further complicating MacArthur’s re-election prospects is his vote for the Republican tax invoice, which the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center mentioned can be most damaging for New Jersey, the place it estimated 10.2 p.c of households would see their federal taxes improve this 12 months. He was the only New Jersey lawmaker to help it.
Mike DuHaime, a strategist who suggested former Republican Gov. Chris Christie on his 2009 marketing campaign, mentioned Kim is benefiting from the “historical and partisan headwinds” going through Republican incumbents in blue states like New Jersey.
“Anyone who thinks Tom MacArthur doesn’t care about those with preexisting conditions is grossly mistaken and completely unaware of the type of person he is,” he wrote in an e mail. “He was trying to forge progress, and when you do that, you will be criticized.”
But in a time of such intense political loyalties, it’s unclear whether or not MacArthur’s position in attempting to repeal the Affordable Care Act can be damaging sufficient to oust him.
“It seems to me in this election people have chosen their tribal corners and issues have less potency overall,” mentioned Tom Moran, the editorial web page editor and political columnist on the state’s largest newspaper, the Star-Ledger.
“But if there is one issue that penetrates,” he added, “it’s health care.”
This story additionally ran on Mic. This story will be republished at no cost (details).
Emmarie Huetteman: ehuetteman@kff.org”>ehuetteman@kff.org, @emmarieDC
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